Kevin Raub

April 10, 2011 –
On Saturday night as U2's 360 Tour became the highest-grossing show of all time ($558 million and counting, surpassing the Rolling Stones' A Bigger Bang tour in 2005-2007), money was not on anyone's mind as the sonic exoskeleton spider crawled into São Paulo's Morumbi Stadium with a heavy heart. Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff announced three days of national mourning after a school shooting in Rio de Janeiro two days prior left 12 students dead. Fortunately, random massacres such as this are even more rare then a U2 concert in Brazil; and if there is anything besides a World Cup championship to brighten the mood -- at least for the 90,000 in attendance -- it's two hours of textural, sociopolitical-fueled rock and roll pomp and circumstance.
Still, the tragedy was not to go unmentioned.